It can be said that in recent years, cold brew coffee has quickly made its way into mainstream.

Cold brew has a smoother chocolate coffee flavor as opposed to other versions of coffee. The reason behind this is the fact that more coffee grounds are used and the steep time can be quite long and delicate since instead of hot water, room temperature or cold water is used for this process.

This bitterless beverage has in turn carved itself a path to reach consumers directly through grocery stores in made-to-go bottles, as well as being incorporated as a drink menu item in coffee shops and some emerging restaurant brands, alike.

Courtesy of Jameson

Cold brew is actually experiencing a 2.4 percentage increase in integration on the Top 150 Emerging Brands. However, when it comes to the integration of cold brew on independent restaurant menus, the drink is actually experiencing a 23.4 decrease year over year when 5,000 concepts were analyzed by Foodable Labs.

This could be a reason why cold brew has been declining in consumer sentiment in the past twelve months. Its score has dropped a whopping 16.2 points from a high 87.4 to a low 71.2 out of 100 points total.

One wouldn’t think this was the case from looking at the new products brands like Jameson and Apothic have been launching.

The brand known for its triple-distilled, Irish whiskey decided to try its luck with a bottled version of the Irish coffee cocktail using cold brew from Fairtrade Arabica beans. The cocktail features “intense coffee bean aromatics combined with vanilla nuttiness of Jameson,” according the brand’s website.

As Foodable has reported in the past, Apothic Brew released in April of this year a red blend wine infused with cold brew. The winemaker, Debbie Juergenson, “realized that many of the characteristics in cold brew coffee and red wine naturally complement each other.” The result? A balanced red wine with a red fruit, mocha, and oak flavor.

Despite the lower consumer sentiment score, social discussion over the topic has actually been up 3.1 percent in the past year. This could be due to the integration of the beverage into established beverage brand products.

So, what exactly is motivating brands to jump outside of their comfort zones and explore new innovative ways to spice up their offerings with flavors like those from cold brew?

What’s for sure is that there’s a growing appreciation for the beverage as Americans continue to learn more about the sourcing and creation process of coffee.

To learn about how popular cold brew coffee brands are ranked by consumer sentiment and who is the leading the demographic consuming it, watch the Industry Pulse video above!

After a quick stint at law school, Hunter Pond decided his true passion laid with the restaurant business.

“I just felt this gravitational pull to the industry and it was strong enough... [that] I dropped out of law school after one semester,” said Pond. “...It was a rough three months trying to convince everybody that this was the right move for me.”

“I studied the marketplace and I saw that the key differentiator in all of the fast casual sandwich players out there was the bread,” said Pond.

According to Pond, everything that went in between the breads tasted the same, from the lettuce and tomatoes to the meats.

“I kind of looked at it as a mathematical equation and thought, ‘if we could just figure out a way… to utilize our kitchen to focus on what goes in between the bread, I can outsource the bread baking to local European-style bakeries and that would produce, in theory, a higher quality product,” said Pond.

Hunter Pond wanted East Hampton to be the ingredient artisan of the sandwich category while partnering with a bread artisan to provide best sandwich possible to consumers.

Take a listen to the podcast above to learn more about East Hampton’s beginnings and future plans!

Show Notes

00:51 - Top 50 Sandwich Innovator Report

02:18 - How Hunter Pond Got His Start

05:50 - Inspiration for East Hampton

07:25 - Key Differentiator in the Fast Casual Sandwich Segment

09:13 - Consumer Driver Is Ingredient Quality

10:27 - Quality Beyond The Food

13:03 - Future Plans for East Hampton

15:47 - Sourcing

24:21 - Instagram

27:42 - Hiring & Real Estate Challenges

30:40 - Hunter Pond’s Industry Outlook

About the Report

The free Top 50 Sandwich Innovator Report is based off a sandwich study conducted by our sister company, Foodable Labs. “We put together a study that looked a consumer sentiment around mentions of their favorite sandwiches and then we poured out the shops and concepts that came out on top through our algorithm…,” says Barron. That’s the same algorithm that ranks Foodable’s Top 25 Restaurants in each city, for example.

Coming soon to Foodable, our free 2018 Top 50 Sandwich Innovators guide and downloadable report will be featuring brands that focus on the artisan approach to high-quality sandwiches. Watch out for sandwich concepts with a focus on premium ingredients, scratch-cooking, and chef-inspired menus!

This mid-July report will dive into the consumer trends for the top 300 sandwich chains, by analyzing a Foodable Labs data set of over 32 thousand locations.

Be sure to watch for the Top 50 Sandwich Innovators Guide and Report soon here on Foodabltv.com.

15:18 - Can Facebook bounce back?

17:20 - Chief Security Officer Alex Stamos

20:17 - Facebook Social Restaurant Visits DOWN 17%

Facebook has been dominating news headlines this week and for good reason. CEO Mark Zuckerberg has been testifying to Congress on the topics of data security and how the social media giant has been trying to improve.

There’s a lot to consider here: How did this impact the election? Is my data safe? Is it finally time to get off the grid?

But before we take drastic measures, take a minute to join Paul Barron for a thought-provoking discussion about what happened and how this scandal may be affecting your restaurant. Didn’t think about that? No worries, we’ll cover everything from how users are engaging with your FB content to how this data debacle is impacting your restaurant sales.

Cambridge Analytica

This is where our story begins. Cambridge Analytica hired a professor to create a Facebook app that collected user data. You’ve seen those fun but useless personality quiz apps on Facebook, right? Right. Users who authorized this app gave the app access to their data like their "Likes". But not just their own data, the data of their entire friend network. This feature was removed in 2014 but the damage was already done.

The important thing to note here is that, up to this point, Cambridge Analytica hadn’t done anything wrong. This was completely legal and in line with Facebook's guidelines in 2014. But when the professor sold the data to Cambridge Analytica, that’s when they violated the Facebook user agreement, which prohibited the sale of Facebook data to third party companies. Facebook removed the professor’s app and demanded that he and all third parties immediately destroy the data but up until now it is believed that Cambridge Analytica still has some or all of the data.

The Impact on Restaurants

Now people across the globe are understandably upset. There are a number of arguments to be made. But what does all this commotion mean for the restaurant industry? Well, as Paul explains, Facebook engagement is down meaning you’ll be having a harder time connecting with your audience using the platform. Social Restaurant Visits through FB are also down.

So, is it time to jump off the Facebook bandwagon? Listen in and find out!

And after you listen to this podcast, join us on Foodable Plus for 10 Tips to Prepare You for the Mass Exodus of Facebook.

Foodable Network

Foodable is the premier Network for the Restaurant and Hospitality industry. As the leading producer of Social TV, we reach hundreds of thousands of social connections that are targeted operators, foodies, chefs, suppliers, and consumers that thrive on learning more about the industry. Though quickly growing, the Foodable Network, featured on YouTube and iTunes, currently hosts seven shows: Table 42, Rock My Restaurant, Across the Bar, Food as a Lifestyle, On Foodable, Fast Casual Nation and more!

News by US City

The way it works

Our Foodable Top 25 restaurant rankings are not hand-selected or chosen by an editor. These lists are based off of unstructured data from Foodable Labs, which tracks over 171K restaurants and brands, and calculates data based on the mass social audience across multiple markets and countries. The Foodable Top 25 drills down into the local-social audience, or geo-located social actions, in each respective city or market we cover. We seek the real social impact of what people think about the experience of your restaurant at the local level.